Humanity
Humanity's homeworld is Earth. The human lineage diverged from the last common ancestor with its closest living relative, the chimpanzee, some five million years ago, evolving into the australopithecines and eventually the genus Homo. The first Homo species to move out of Africa was Homo erectus, the African variety of which, together with Homo heidelbergensis, is considered to be the immediate ancestor of modern humans. Homo sapiens originated in Africa, where it reached anatomical modernity about 200,000 BCE and began to exhibit full behavioural modernity around 50,000 years ago.'' Homo sapiens'' proceeded to colonize the continents, arriving in Eurasia 125,000–60,000 BCE, Australia around 42,000 BCE, the Americas around 17,000 BCE, and remote islands such as Hawaii, Easter Island, Madagascar, and New Zealand between the years AD 300 and 1280. Humans began to practice sedentary agriculture about 14,000 BCE, domesticating plants and animals which allowed for the growth of civilization. Humans subsequently established various forms of government, religion, and culture around the world, unifying people within a region and leading to the development of states and empires. The rapid advancement of scientific and medical understanding in the 19th and 20th centuries led to the development of fuel-driven technologies and improved health, causing the human population to rise exponentially. Entering the 21st, 22nd and 23rd centuries with increased scientific knowledge, allowing the population to live off the planet. With individuals widespread in every continent except Antarctica, which by 2400 had several human settlements using materials and energy gathered off planet, showing humans to be a cosmopolitan species. By 7813 the global human population was estimated to be around 23 billion, while estimates put total galactic human population at around 32 trillion. Orbital and Intra-Solar History The First manned human spaceflight was launched by the nation of the Soviet Union on April 12th 1961, the first human space walk was conducted by Alexey Leonov on the 18th March 1965 and the first human on another extra-terrestrial body was Neil Armstrong when he stood on the surface of Earth's only planetary satellite; the Moon, on July 20th 1969. 21st Century The latter half of the 20th century saw the construction of the International Space Station which was continually manned, until the station’s controlled destruction in 2021 by orbit decay over the Pacific Ocean. The race to Mars then followed. Mars being a planet similar in size to the earth lies approximately 78,300,000km further from its parent star, Sol, than the Earth. The historical date of the race is said to have begun on November 12th 2024, when the nation of China announced its intention to put a man on Mars by 2030. This brought the nation in direct diplomatic conflict with reigning superpower the United States of America. The U.S.A responded by declaring it would put a man on Mars in December 2029. Both missions were launched around the same time, with only two days difference in the launch dates; USA: 12th December 2029, while China launched 14th December 2029. However three months into the mission the USA's space programme admitted that there had been an extreme loss of pressure in the landing compartment on the ship. Therefore, although the space craft would orbit the planet in order to slingshot back to Earth, there would be no Mars landing. China's own mission landed on the Mars July 17th 2030, with Xai Wen being the first human to set foot on the planet. During World War III in the late 21st Century, space became an important battleground, with GPS and missile satellites needing protection. During the early years of the conflict, 2073-2075, missiles were fired from the ground in an attempt to destroy enemy satellites. However this process was expensive and often impractical. In 2075, the first space fighter was launched, with the sole intention on destroying minor, defenceless satellites. The craft had only a limited oxygen supply and could only remain in orbit for thirteen minutes before fuel restrictions made a safe re-entry and landing unlikely. However during the Great Stalemate, 2075-2078, both sides launched Orbital fighters, leading to each new model becoming more complex and better designed. In the final years of the war 2078-2081, the design of the fighters had improved to the point where orbital dogfights were a major tactical element of the war, with orbital superiority now being preferred to air superiority. 22nd Century The Treaty of Prague was signed, ending the war, the three major remaining powers, China, the United States and The European Republic focused on gaining diplomatic and political power, they all turned to space once again. In 2100, the European Republic commissioned the first permanent orbital habitat, designed so that expansion would one day include the building of much larger spacecraft. 2122 - The first human baby, conceived in space was born on American controlled Superstation, Eden. However, the parents were both from Ghana. By 2150, there were eight large "Superstations" orbiting Earth. Total human population in space stood at 781 million. Mining the Moon, using Solar energy gathered from Solar flares, radiation and sunlight in space provided nearly 100% of Earth and the Superstations power. In 2152, the first Space miner ship was designed and created. A large craft consisting of a crew of 300 would spend a 650 day round trip to the asteroid belt to mine for materials uncommon on Earth and metals that could be gathered in large quantities at cheaper levels than bringing them directly from the planet’s surface. The distance between Earth and the surrounding planets was now a bridgeable gap, unlike the pioneers of a hundred years before. However, the fact it still took many months to even reach the outer gas giants, Uranus and Neptune, made humanity question its current methods of propulsion. The race to warp began in 2170. Due to tensions between the United States and the European Republic over mining rights in the Asteroid Belt, faster and faster engines were being designed. Both states used the Quantum Thruster designed first suggested in the 21st century. China opted for a reactionless vacuum drive to begin with but changed to the Quantum Thruster later in the race, however, never made up significant ground to compete with the USA and Europe. On August 8th 2181, almost one hundred years to the day since the end of the Third World War, Christopher Steele Captain of a three member crew piloted the ESV (European Space Vessal) Zeus in the first Faster-Than-Light propulsion trip in human history. Travelling to the Outer Rings of Saturn, 9.2AU at that point, (approximately 75 light minutes) in 17 minutes and 23 seconds. The ship took a sample of Saturn Ring Rock as proof of its endeavour and brought it back to Earth, in a round trip of 53 minutes and 54 seconds. The rock, known as Steele, a play on its metallic like appearance, is stored in the European Republic's Central Superstation. Death of Religion During the 24th century, a census attempting to count the universal remaining belief in old religions such as Christianity, Islam and Judaism found that only 0.0009% of the human population felt a strong belief in God, with only a slightly higher figure depicting any sort of religious belief, 0.002%. This equates to a rough estimate of about 500,000 people of the 25,000,000,000 total population. Early Post-Warp History Warp engines still left even the closest stars as far flung prospects. The first trip to one of these stars took 318 days, Proxima Centauri was the destination. The pilot, again, Captain Steele, discovered a tiny rocky planet orbiting close to its parent star, it was named Proxima 1. Steele ordered that the ship land on Proxima 1 to collect materials from the rocky planet. Upon stepping onto the planet he spoke the following words "We shall place no flag, for this is an achievement for all humanity to revel." The team then took some of the rocks from the surrounding area and left a small golden plaque, inscribed with information about humanity and a small beacon that would alert passing life that humanity existed. His return to the Sol system at a completed time of 604 days on July 1st 2187, meant that not only had his return trip been significantly shorter, due to advancements made by the onboard engineering team, but also that Steele and his crew were the first humans to make a round trip to extra-solar planet. A statue of the ESV Zeus that had completed both the faster than light trip and the round extra-solar trip was erected in one of the European Republic superstations "New London" due to Captain Steele's birth near the terrstrial London. Health In the year 2200, humanity began introduce mandatory programs of DNA alteration, such as the increase ability to fight dieases in the human body. This was highly successful and directly led to the eradication of HIV and AIDS, TB, Ebola, heart disease and Malaria among thousands of others. Adding to this, in 2205 was the introduction of the anti-cancer gene, which introduced naturally made pathogens into the human blood stream that would search for cancer cells and destory them. By 2212, all forms of cancer in the innoculated population and children of innoculated were eradicated. By 2220, scientists had come up with what would charactise the human race in centuries to come. The adding of junk DNA to base codes, extending the human life threefold. A select group of people were chosen to get this treatment as, currently, humanity was still very much dependent on its homeworld, meaning a longer living population could cause severe logisical problems. The first such person was Xero, as in patient zero, a name she took on herself after her treatment. She lived to see her 223rd birthday in the year 2420, before succumbing to DNA fracturing. This is where the human DNA after replicating itself so many times, becomes disjointed and broken, scientists at this time were still unsure as to what actually caused it. This treatment was banned in 2228 until humanity could find a way to exist without relying utterly on its homeworld. Space Exploration Upon Christopher Steele's death in 2209, the Steele foundation was set up, in which young members of families with extremely low income that passed an entrance exam, were taught until the age of 22 about space flight, piloting and physics. The foundation is given as one of the reasons humanity sparked a period of learning. The warp engine had undergone a redesign, now capable of travelling to Saturn in under two seconds and to Proxima 1 in just under 6 days. Further regions of the galaxy could now be explored, visiting planets first 5 light years away, then 10, then 15. Gap inbetween advances shrunk and within fifty years of Captain Steele's first flight to Proxima 1, it could now be made in just over 4 days. Still, no planet containing anything more complex than extremophiles had been found. Although they had technically discovered 'life' on other planets, they had not found multicelled organisms. In 2239, while on a routine flight to mine some asteroids in the Oort Cloud, the USS Cole, picked up strange subsonar blips coming from an object with several light minutes. The object was not naturally made, the chemicals detected were certainly industrially made. The Captain ordered USS Cole to find and capture the object. After searching for several hours, the crew found a small object, the Voyager 1 space probe. It had sustained a minor impact which had led to the communications dish becoming cracked but aside from this, it was not too badly damaged. It now resides in the Museum of Space Flight in Houston, Texas. KOI-1686.01 2245, the European Space Exploration Agency, along with the South American Space Programme commissioned a group of 200 scientists, engineers and pilots to begin a journey to KOI-1686.01, as it was known at the time. The trip would take 3.6 years to reach the planet before a similar return journey. After an invitation by the SASP and ESEA, the United States, China along with some smaller nations, also contributed their best scientists for the journey. April 30th 2247, the ship know as Olympus Fire, or simply Olympus, was launched from the European Superstation; New Madrid. Communications with the ship became only short packages of information as the technology to send complex video or text communications still lagged behind propulsion technology. October 27th 2250, Olympus dropped out of Faster-than-light speed, unexpectedly, several days before it was due to do so. No damage appeared to be the cause, however, six minutes later, humanity made first contact. "Is there someone there?" Was the message that Captain Vidal sent on a wide scope spectrum. The reply, noises from an alien race, language, but one that neither Vidal or his crew even vaguely understood. Instead, they attempting to communicate in Lincos, the mathematical constant language. Though the language was basic, it was hoped that the race could at least reply. They did. The message went as such, "What is the x such that 2x=5" from Captain Vidal. Until a response of "5/2" was given, and the final message in Lincos was "Good" from Captain Vidal. Later that same day, the Olympus was 'towed' to the inner part of the system. Captain Vidal would describe the sight as one he'd dreamed of as a child. The planet was drenched in an ice sheet, aside from at the equator and some other isolated sections where there seemed to be gaps in the ice, revealing land and ocean under it. There were several moons in orbit around it along with what seemed like hundreds of space stations. All the moons had been throughly colonised and the amount of traffic around the planet made it look like a hive of swarming bees. The ship was taken to a nearby spacestation and was docked. Captain Vidal wrote in his records that they were kept waiting at this point for at least an hour. He later discovered that they had scanned the atmosphere within the ship and were simulating it in a room in the station as humans would be unable to breath their air. When they stepped out they were greeted by the Yi'puli, all wearing a form of breathing apparatus. They are a senitent race of amphibious creatures that spoke largely in clicks. Both parties exchanged gifts and data, showing language, homeworlds, history, biology, scientific advancements, films, etc. In fact, the scientific data showed that humanity was far more advanced in terms of long distance propulsion and weaponary, whilst the Yi'puli were superior in terms of terraforming and had overcome communicating with long distances, most likely as their ships took years to reach nearby stars and communicating was more needed than on human ships. Using the Yi'puli's communication network data and video were able to be sent back to Earth, although it would not be a live feed, they would still recieve it in only few days time, while, without it, they would not have been able to report back for another year and a half. The crew spent three weeks communicating with the race, gaining as much insight into them as possible, taking and giving gifts and learning about the extensive culture, some members of the crew even managed to learn some very basic Yi'puli dialect, while the Yi'puli commander famously asked Captain Vidal what the meaning of 'Heavy' was after watching a hastily translated version of Back to the Future, from the famous ctachphrase "This is heavy." The Olympus, after three weeks docked with the station known as the Tk'pali, began its journey home, fitted with new communication devices to recieve and send messages home. Sustained Relations Upon the return of the Olympus to Earth in February 2253, Captain Videl and his crew recieved a heroes welcome. The planet had already been made away through long range communications that they had discovered other sentient life. But not only did it just exist, it was also friendly, which had been the subject of a lot of debate prior to the launch of the craft. With the addition of extra Yi'puli technology and trade in particular, scientists had begun making huge advances in their own technology, as if the Yi'puli had given a slight hint as to what sort of technology lay ahead. This culminated in the first human to visit the Yi'puli homeworld in 2257, now, Admiral Videl himself, who had been given the office of Yi'puli embassador. As the Faster-than-Light engines began getting larger and more powerful, the trip was cut from 3.6 years to 11 months over the course of the next twenty years. By 2280, Yi'puli-Human trade was no longer a novelty but a part of life. The creation of the co-habitation Super station, above the Yi'puli homeworld allowed for a permenant human presence in the region. By 2290 rumours were beginning to circulate that the European Republic, United States of America and China were planning a joint venture, supported by the South American Consortium and the African Confederation, with the Yi'puli people. The rumours differed wildly, some believed that a huge fleet was going to be built, the idea of terraforming Mars or Venus was also a strong one. However, in 2300, the rumours were finally answered, but none had gotten it correct. Under the name The Earth, the previously mentioned states agreed a treaty with the Yi'puli, that a combined effort to Terraform the Moon would be untaken. Reasons for this vary wildly, some believe that the Yi'puli felt undermined by humanity's better technology and were attempting to make a statement in a region that they far out classed humanity, another is merely that the Earth paid them well, the highest estimate around the 83 sextillion Euros area. Due to a technology crafted over several hundred years, the Yi'puli claimed the ability to terraform a planet within a lifetime. The treaty had permitted up to 100 years to complete it, despite humanity believing that the entire endevour would most likely take many hundreds of years. However, the Yi'puli set themselves an artificial timeframe, that it would be ready for human habitiation in 60 years. The Moon was completely terraformed by 2359, with the human settlement, Nova, being the first of many. By 2400, the population had risen from 302 from the first days of Nova, to well over 500 million. Many Yi'puli had settled here too, despite the need for domes designed specifically for the Yi'puli, as a human atmosphere was not capable of sustaining them. Galactic History Consular Contact After the terraforming of the Moon, humans would go on to Terraform Mars, Venus and Europa within their own solar system. However, both the Yi'puli and Humanity, were beginning to wonder how many other lifeforms were around the Galaxy. A journey to the centre of the Galaxy was proposed, however, the trip would take around 27 years merely to reach the centre, meaning that, if no life existed, it would be a one-way trip, besides there were far more areas to explore closer to home. Another mission was the trip to the constellation NGC-188 was finally decided upon. The fact there were so many stars in this region, meant that the possibility of discovering life on at least one of these was high. Not only this but scientists from Earth and the Yi'puli homeworld, Thyriss, had three candidates of planets in the region that could possibly harbour advanced life. The region was closer to Earth, therefore the ship, built in combination with Yi'puli and Human commanders, set off from Eden Space station on 2409. It took the 500 strong crew six years to reach the constellation. The first was NGC-188 Alpha, this sun was large and bright, but no planets had formed, only a large disc that would one day create planets. They moved on. Next was NGC-188 Gamma. A large water hosting planet was discovered, it contained, primitive life on its surface, plants and animals, but after extensive research no sentient life was found. The planet was renamed, Ryphon, an ancient Yi'puli mythological being, known for giving life. In the second year of their tour around this area a human monitoring the communications channels picked up a gargled message. The language could not be understood, but it was certainly an intelligent life. After a month of searching for the signal, the team searched and finally came upon the Planet they called NGC-188-009-Beta. When they finally slowed down enough for visual confirmation they saw an bustling colony. Ships thousands of times larger than the one they inhabited. What seemed to be all different shapes and sizes too. Six planets in the system were terraformed, each with multiple moons, which were all also terraformed. Every object in the system seemed to have multiple superstations around them. The race, centered around a predominantely green planet, second planet from the sun. It's name, Kypael. It hosted a species called the Vitosi. The usual meet and greets then commenced. The Vitosi gave several gifts, with the Human-Yi'puli crew offering some in return. All gifts were cultural, and it seemed, that all Vitosi technology was far more advanced than anything the Human-Yi'puli crew could offer.